this post was submitted on 31 Jul 2024
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Fedigrow

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submitted 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

Saw a suspicious post resurrecting a 5 month old thread, and after a few back and forths:

https://linux.community/comment/3453531

I don’t understand why you are treating me like a robot. However, I can help with the Fibonacci sequence. Here is a Python 3 function to calculate it:

I'm torn, its nice to have activity in the fediverse, but I'm not convinced bots are the right way to go about it. Opinions on the future of engagement bots?

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (4 children)

I don't think bots are a good way to boost engagement, but I don't think all bots should be banned either.

In The Other Place, I enjoyed labeled bots which performed a clear function or service, and replied only in specific circumstances, such as when they were summoned or a key phrase was mentioned.

Examples: stabbot, more JPEG auto, metric converter.

Can you think of any other examples of "useful bots"?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I could swear there was a community link fixer bot, which is pretty useful for people reading comments, trying to click a link to a community, and getting an error. Bot has the correct link as a reply.

Community-specific bots can be quite helpful. NameThatSong on Reddit had a bot that would run your post through song recognizer bots if your post had audio, to try to help the poster identify the song. I found it useful. I should probably figure out how to make a similar bot for [email protected] someday.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

I could swear there was a community link fixer bot

Yup, there is: @[email protected]

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Some people are engaging with the weekly posts on [email protected] (sadly having federation issues) that are in theory using a bot, but in practice mods have been manually making the post. But people engaged when it was actually the bot posting too.

[email protected], [email protected] definitely have weekly posts that get interacted with. [email protected] used to, they are not regularly posted anymore, but when they are people interact. However, on all those communities, as far as I know (I think the post scheduler posts with your account so for all I know the bot could post it?), humans are making the bog-standard "what is going on in your community/active communities/what are you playing this week?" posts and I wonder if the fact a human is posting is what is driving the engagement there.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

the remind me in X days bot!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It may not have been useful, but the gandolf and gronk bots provided many entertainment. My joyful emotion was used, at least

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Definitely! Entertainment absolutely qualifies as valid "utility", especially in the less serious meme communities.